All the dates you need to put in your diary for the summer including the new earlier transfer window deadline.

This summer is going to be busy for Saints and with the transfer window now officially opened at 00.01 hrs on May 17th there could be a quick burst before the World Cup starts in earnest on Thursday June 14th.

Saints will hopefully not putting too much stock on the World Cup, history is riddled with players who have been bought at over inflated prices due to a fine World Cup and the buying club has then found that their new signing is not quite what he is cracked up to be.

James Rodriguez still of Real Madrid is a good example, after a great World Cup in 2014 he was signed with great fanfare by Real Madrid for 63 million euros, but he has never established himself as a starter at Real Madrid and last season was shipped off on loan at his own request to Bayern Munich where he has recaptured some of his former glory but he will not go to this year's World Cup with the same reputation thathe ended the last one with.

The tournament means that it will be hard to sign players for approximately a month with the Final not due to be held till July 15th.

That means that there will be only a three week window before the start of the Premier League season and following an agreement between the clubs, the Premier League window will close on the Thursday before the start of the new season at probably 5pm on August 9th.

Absurdly Premier League teams can still sell players abroad once the domestic window is closed as windows in other countries remains at the end of August putting those clubs competing in Europe at a distinct disadvantage.

This is only a Premier League ruling and Championship clubs will be able to continue to deal in the transfer market both incoming and outgoing deals till the official deadline at the end of August.

So this transfer window is likely to have all the frenzy for Premier clubs at least of a January window, perhaps worse, it will be very difficult for clubs to sign players who are at the World Cup much after the end of next week, then the International squads will start to convene and even Countries who do not qualify from the group stages will not be releasing their players from duty till the final group games being played 25th-28th June.

Losing quarter finalists will be on the plane 30th June-3rd July, losing semi finalists 10-11th July and then the final on 15th.

No Country is likely to let their players leave a training camp and be distracted by transfers from the end of May till at least the end of June, that will leave an effective transfer window of barely 5 weeks.

Photo: Action Images

SaintBrock added 13:56 - May 22 "The Premier League's summer transfer window opened on 17 May 2018, for domestic transfers, and will be open from 00:01 BST, 9 June, for international transfers. It will close at 17:00 BST on Thursday, 9 August." From the PL website
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Santos added 15:26 - May 22 Not sure we will manage to sign Hughes before June the 9th! The speed our board seem to go at!!!! Accept these contracts have to be meticulous but how come other clubs can sack and then appoint a new manager whilst we are still in talks. Especially when all parties are happy including most of the fans.
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BuyEastleighFC4aBtea added 18:21 - May 22 I am not sure why many of my fellow Saints are so easily convinced Mark Hughes is the right manager for us? When you consider A Wenger is available? For me if a better manager is free to join us we should try to get the best...!
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BoondockSaint added 18:26 - May 22 I think there is some very small fine print at the bottom of the Premier League web site: "Applicable to all Premier League clubs except Southampton: Outgoing transfers for them begin at the same time as all the other clubs. However, incoming transfers will be limited to the last week or days. This is at the request of their board who only plan on signing the one or two players left over after all the other clubs have strengthened their sides."

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SaintBrock added 15:12 - May 23 Yeah, I saw that
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petedoors1 added 08:58 - May 24 WE NEED TO GET A MANAGER FIRST AND THE WAY ITS GOING WE MAY NOT HAVE ONE BY THE TIME THE NEW SEASON STARTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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IWOZTHERE added 16:03 - May 24 As the scousers showed, clubs can make preliminary agreements with players outside the window... It's been obvious where we've been weak since the Summer, Is this board only ever 'reactive'? Others seem to plan in advance allowing them to move quickly when the 'window' opens? It's compounded this time round because they need to sign Hughes up first. I doubt that his demands are unreasonable, so why the delay?. Perhaps our cash surplus is destined elsewhere? The supporters worries are based on their scepticism about the Board's motives, ambition and based on recent history, mistakes. We don't want another Summer of neglect, inaction and incompetence.

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